Saints Among Us

Matthew 5: 1-12  

November 1, 2026 

All Saints
John Singer Seargent

All Saints Day

 

My home congregation is in New York in Manhattan,

and the neighborhood that it’s in on the upper-upper

West Side was going through a kind of re-building in the 1950’s,

like a lot of neighborhoods in New York did.

They were taking down old single family houses,

like brownstones and small apartments houses,

and tenement houses and putting up new high rises

and massive housing projects.

 

For at least 6 blocks around the church, everything was torn down

We had pictures of the neighborhood, everything that you could see

was torn down to the ground. It looked like a bomb had it..

Except for one structure, Trinity Lutheran Church,

stuck up in the middle of all the rubble.

The church was going to be torn down, the city developers and the

American Lutheran Church, and I believe even the church council 

agreed that it would be the best decision. 

The church building was over 50 years old and was having problems since day one. 

So the bulldozers came to knock it down, and the ladies of the church, 

the Lutheran Church Women of the congregation 

sat on the steps of the church and refused to let the bulldozers do it.

I was told this story a little while after 

becoming a member at the church. 

I was told that Lydia Schneider, Anna Klein, and Katherine Krider 

were three of those women that sat on those steps.

I was told details about them: they were strong and stubborn,

that they were dedicated to the church. 

Two were widows. One of them baked the best sweet rolls. 

There was a picture of them in the office area. 

It was like a portrait of them and a few other women from like the 1930’s. 

They were sitting stoically, intimidating, no smiles.

I was told that their bravery and hard-headedness was,

for better or worse (depending on who you talked to)

what kept the church standing.

So I asked the person who was telling me this story for the first time, 

(Sharon, who would become a big influence on my faith),

“Did you know these women?” 

I didn’t think she was a part of the church until the 1970’s. 

She said, “Oh, no. They were all long gone by the 1960’s. 

She looked around. I don’t think anyone that’s here right now ever met them.” 

She said, “Now we never met them, but that doesn't mean we don't know them.”

 

In my years at Trinity, I would get to know these women too.

And I would tell this story to other people who came to our church.

These ladies - and many other people - were the legacy that we lived under and with. 

Their strong will and stubbornness were part of the spirit of that church, 

they were still active parts of the congregation.

I never met those women, never looked at them or shook their hands

or tasted their sweet rolls,

But I knew those women as part of my church.

 

This is one of my favorite parts about belonging to a church.

There is a connection with people, even beyond death.

Even though members from years ago are no longer with us,

they are still part of our community, part of our lives,

part of our conversations, part of our present.

 

Today is All Saints Sunday.

Originally, All Saints Day was a time to remember saints:

specific people who had attained some sort of religious holiness

and prestige and were therefore named “saints” by the Roman Catholic Church.

 

Martin Luther rejected the idea that certain people

were some how different or contained special powers

that they should be honored for. 

Luther believed that all of us were made Saints

just by hearing the word of God.

  

Luther wrote:

“At whatever time God’s Word is taught, preached, 

heard, read, or pondered, there the person, the day, and the work is hallowed,

not on account of the external work

but on account of the Word that makes us all saints.”

 

Think of the countless number of people who have heard,

read or pondered the Word of God here at Christ Lutheran

All the people who have been inspired to do works

of justice and mercy, all those who have cared for one another.

All the people who have been welcomed into sainthood.

 

It’s a crowed place here in God’s Kingdom!

Some of them we have met, some we remember by name.

But all of them have made up the fabric of this community

therefore we know them they are a part of us.

 

This year, since the last All Saints day, we lost

two important people to our community:

Ingrid Low and Doris Stickel.

We feel their absence.

We miss their physical presence, their voices,

their personalities, and the things

that made them who they were.

 

And yet, their lives haven’t simply come to an end as far as

this congregation is concerned.

Their faith, their love, and their dedication

continue to flow through this church.

 

As someone said, “their fingerprints are all over this community.”

And the fingerprints of so many countless others who came before them too. 

Their influence continues in the people they touched,

the kindness they offered, the faith they shared,

and the example they left behind.

 

And our Christian faith promises us

something even greater than the

ongoing presence of those who have died.

It promises that God's love joins us beyond death too.

 

When we are baptized,

we are joined to Christ and welcomed

into a family that extends far beyond

the people sitting beside us in church.

We join all the saints who have been baptized at Christ Lutheran

we also join the countless people who have been baptized in 

fonts, pools, and rivers, and oceans around the entire world.

And also the millions of saints that have been baptized

in the name of the triune God throughout history.

 

And we join with all the saints of this century,

and through the previous centuries,

back through Renaissance,

through the middle ages,

and back to the birth of the Christian Church

and to Paul and the original 12 apostles

and to Jesus himself in the Jordan.

 

And as a part of the Church throughout the ages,

we’re more than just friends, we are even more than just family.

We are linked together by a stronger bond than blood or affection.

We are joined together by God and God’s love.

A never ending bond.

And we are on a journey together.

 

We are joined together with all the poor in spirit,

with all who have mourned, with the meek,

those who have hungered for righteousness.

We are joined with the merciful, the pure in heart,

the peacemakers and the persecuted.

 

That is what All Saints day is about.

As Christians, we believe in eternal life,

we believe that God’s family doesn’t end at death.

And that we belong to a large community

that doesn’t just include those people who are with us now,

but those people who are no longer with us.

 

The people that we named are still with us today.

Along with the people who started this church

on October 28^st, 1973, and all those who have

been part of this congregation over the years,

including Ingrid and Doris.

All of them are still with us today as well.

 

The church is bigger than the people we can see.

It is bigger than the people sitting in these pews today.

It is bigger than the people whose names

we remember and the lives we celebrate.

It includes those who have gone before us,

those who worship alongside us now,

and those who will come after us.

And all of us are held together by the love of God.

 

In the end, we celebrate All Saints Sunday,

not because we believe that the dead

are somehow more powerful

or more holy than the living.

We celebrate All Saints Day because we know

that God's love is more powerful than death.